Insights & News

The Next Generation of Deal Sourcing

Robert Goldsmith, President & CEO of BCMS Corporate North America, was recently interviewed on the firm’s recent successes using AxialMarket – an industry leading web-based platform connecting buyers and sellers of multimillion-dollar deals.

According to the Dow Jones report, two new web-based platforms that compete with AxialMarket have launched in Europe in recent months. Goldsmith says, “AxialMarket is the frontrunner in this industry. Its management team is completely in tune to the market and they use their insider knowledge of the industry to assist in getting deals done. AxialMarket in particular intelligently matches buyers and sellers. It is direct and it’s targeted, and it far outpaces any of the competition that I’ve seen.”

When selling a middle market company it’s imperative that you explore every avenue to uncover the right strategic buyers. These online platforms provide real-time access to the buying habits and acquisition criteria of private equity and other buyers. The Dow Jones report goes on to comment that platforms such as AxialMarket, “give boutique banks more competitive muscle and change how multimillion-dollar deals are sourced by private equity and strategic buyers.”

These new platforms are a big step up from the “bulletin board” style sites such as BizBuySell.com and Bizquest.com, which attempt to sell business more like real estate listings -- as opposed to creating strategic partnerships and acquisitions focused on growth and opportunity. Gregory Millman of Dow Jones goes on to quote Mike Handelsman, group general manager of LoopNet Inc, the company that owns both these websites, "We serve what we define as the Main Street business for sale: restaurants, gas stations, dry cleaners, retail stores, smaller manufacturing businesses," he says, “most of them with Ebitda under $1 million.”

LoopNet Inc, an online marketplace for commercial real estate that earned about $16 million on $78 million in sales in 2010. Today, business listings account for "a minority" of those figures.

BCMS Corporate used AxialMarket in 2009 when compiling a list of over 100 strategic purchasers for Precision Pipeline Solutions. The ultimate acquirer, Sentinel Capital Partners, was one of the several bidding parties originally sourced through AxialMarket.

For more information about online deal sourcing platforms please visit the AxialMarket website.